How we found our Tao in developing an application for Windows 8

    The Windows 8 application for the Komsomolskaya Pravda TV and Radio Channel was our first development for this platform. Nevertheless, we took up it already being burdened with sufficient experience in developing mobile applications for the media: for example, we already had Newsweek, Engadget, Washington Post and even the same TV and radio channel “Komsomolki” in our arsenal (only for iOS ) . Nevertheless, when we came across Windows 8, it turned out that we had a lot to learn and something to ponder.

    What did the customer want

    Customers from Komsomolskaya Pravda set very simple tasks: so that both radio and TV were available on one screen, and that all this spoke and showed. This Zen-TZ at first did not bother us ...

    Do you remember how it all started…

    At the start, we did not particularly sweat and reflect, but just got together and came up with ... still life. That is, the first brainstorming ended with the fact that we came up with a skeuomorphic design familiar to any iOS developer with a detailed traced retro radio and telecom and with the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda, in which the herring is wrapped.


    Something like that ...

    Having come up with beauty, we calmed down.

    Why I had to violate the laws of Microsoft

    First of all, we, of course, sat down in the guidelines and went through all the existing applications available for viewing. As a result of this work, it became clear: it’s already possible to panic. Because absolutely nothing of the proposed did not suit us! The very concept of the application and the requirements of the customer tightly blocked us the way to the implementation of Microsoft guidelines.

    We had literally nothingto implement the correct concept: no photo gallery, no news feed, nothing that could make up a hub - zero content, there is simply nothing to scroll in the application! More precisely, of course, it was possible to make a hub for the program, but then all the controls would leave, and the customer wanted everything to fit on one screen. On the hands were such cards: TV control panel, radio control panel and program guide. And all this, in accordance with the will of the customer, was to live on one screen.

    To top it all, we were not able to meet a single application similar to ours: even the most ascetic interfaces still contained at least some kind of content - photos or texts. It turns out that our application was supposed to be the most-most minimalistic. We honestly tried to use at least some chips, but nothing suited us, everything was completely inapplicable in the guidelines in our case. From there, only one share button came in handy.

    Then we suspected something and began to understand that the path of the TV and herring was not our path ...

    Neither vodka nor herring

    So, we had in our hands a crystal-clear application on a single screen, with which you can do only two things - watch TV and listen to the radio. Appropriate design was required. Every day, our designer began with meditations on the application and every day we threw something away until there were only 3 colors left ...



    ... and no volume - we got an absolutely flat, minimalistic, pure as lotus flower application that didn’t even go beyond Windows 8 framework, and soared somewhere above the sinful world.

    Adventure continues

    Some technical aspects of working on the application were also not immediately given to us.

    Initially, the customer provided the stream in the Http Live Streaming format . This format is native to Apple and is well supported on Android. Therefore, when working on the appropriate applications for the iPhone and for android systems, there were no problems. But Microsoft decided not to notice this common format, and its support is completely absent in Windows (both Windows Phone and Windows 8).

    This flaw is filled by 3ivx, which created sdk for developing applications for Windows and plans to release support for Windows Phone. But their component is very expensive - 3.5 thousand dollars, plus difficulties with paperwork. Therefore, we decided to ask the customer to put a nearby video stream in a different format. Smooth Streaming format , which is supported by Microsoft, was chosen . For application development, Microsoft wrote the corresponding SDK , which is also available as an extension for Visual Studio.

    In addition, we wrote a small library to simplify the work with the MVVM template and facilitate the development process.. In the next article, we will talk about it in more detail. We hope that some of the readers will be able to save some development time with it.

    This library has support for behaviors. Sometimes, depending on the task, we use them to process device turns. In fact, this leads to the regeneration of interface elements. Quite convenient, especially if you want to support snapped view. But this method is not suitable for this application, because MediaElement is designed so that when a parent is lost, the video stops. Therefore, in order for the video to not be interrupted when the device is rotated, I had to use VisualStateManager for the interface, which is less convenient with a complex interface that is not sharpened for scattering of tiles.

    What did we get

    The main feature of the Komsomolskaya Pravda TV channel for Windows 8 compared to the iPhone version is switching using gestures between TV and radio. We do not need to leave the screen anywhere, just, being in the TV window, pull up the radio window:



    Whereas in the iOS version you need to switch the button: To



    go to another screen in the case of iOS, you need to ask a question in live broadcast:



    Windows 8 quickly wears off this, you try to fit everything in one place:



    The same story with the share button. As we have already said, sharing is the only thing in our application that meets the requirements.



    After some time of “communication” with the application for Windows 8, iOS solutions begin to be perceived as visually overloaded.

    What we learned for ourselves from this story

    The most important thing is that we, people of the iOS mentality, apple worshipers who are used to thinking in the Apple paradigm, managed to step our song on the throat and do something completely different from the usual interface and design.
    And by the way, after our "Komsomolskaya Pravda" was already published on the Marketplace , there we found an even more minimalistic application!

    It looks like this:



    So, we have something to strive for in our enlightenment :)

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